The Envisionment and Discovery Collaboratory (EDC)

by Ernest G. Arias, Hal Eden, Gerhard Fischer

2022 · Springer Nature

The Envisionment and Discovery Collaboratory (EDC) is a long-term research platform exploring immersive socio-technical environments in which stakeholders can collaboratively frame and solve problems and discuss and make decisions in a variety of application domains and different disciplines. The knowledge to understand, frame, and solve these problems does not already exist, but is constructed and evolves in ongoing interactions and collaborations among stakeholders coming from different disciplines providing a unique and challenging environment to study, foster, and support human-centered informatics, design, creativity, and learning. At the social level, the EDC is focused on the collaborative construction of artifacts rather than the sharing of individually constructed items. It brings individuals together in face-to-face meetings, encouraging and supporting them to engage, individually and collectively, in action and reflection. At the technological level, the EDC integrates tabletop computing environments, tangible objects, sketching support, geographic information systems, visualization software, and an envisioned virtual implementation. This book is based on 20 years of research and development activities that brought together interdisciplinary teams of researchers, educators, designers, and practitioners from different backgrounds. The EDC originated with the merging of two research paradigms from disparate disciplines to build on the strengths, approaches, and perspectives of each. This book describes the artifacts and scenarios that were developed, with the goal of providing inspiration for human-centered informatics not focused on technologies in search of a purpose but on the development of systems supporting stakeholders to explore personally meaningful problems. These developments have inspired numerous research and teaching activities. The challenges, prototypical systems, and lessons learned represent important milestones in the development and evolution of the EDC that are relevant for future research activities and practices in human-centered informatics.

Freedom Rising

by Ernest B. Furgurson

2007 · Vintage

In this luminous portrait of wartime Washington, Ernest B. Furgurson–author of the widely acclaimed Chancellorsville 1863, Ashes of Glory, and Not War but Murder--brings to vivid life the personalities and events that animated the Capital during its most tumultuous time. Here among the sharpsters and prostitutes, slaves and statesmen are detective Allan Pinkerton, tracking down Southern sympathizers; poet Walt Whitman, nursing the wounded; and accused Confederate spy Antonia Ford, romancing her captor, Union Major Joseph Willard. Here are generals George McClellan and Ulysses S. Grant, railroad crew boss Andrew Carnegie, and architect Thomas Walter, striving to finish the Capitol dome. And here is Abraham Lincoln, wrangling with officers, pardoning deserters, and inspiring the nation. Freedom Rising is a gripping account of the era that transformed Washington into the world’s most influential city.

African Americans in Hawai'i

by D. Molentia Guttman, Ernest Golden, African American Diversity Cultural Center Hawai'i

2011 · Arcadia Publishing

During the early 1800s, about two dozen men of African descent lived in Hawai'i. The most noteworthy was Anthony D. Allen, a businessman who had traveled around the world before making Hawai'i his home and starting a family there in 1810. The 25th Black Infantry Regiment, also known as the Buffalo Soldiers, arrived in Honolulu at the Schofield Barracks in 1913. They built an 18-mile trail to the summit of Mauna Loa, the world's largest shield volcano, and constructed a cabin there for research scientists. After World War II, the black population of Hawai'i increased dramatically as military families moved permanently to the island. Hawai'i has a diverse population, and today about 35,000 residents, approximately three percent, claim African ancestry.